Potential Therapies for Infectious Diseases Based on Targeting Immune Evasion Mechanisms That Pathogens Have in Common With Cancer Cells

Although global infectious diseases such as smallpox have essentially been eliminated, many are not well controlled, underlining a critical need for new, more effective therapies. Pathogens and pathogen-infected host cells can evade immune surveillance by the human body by employing – like cancer cells – immune evasion mechanisms. The present study indicates that pathogenic bacteria, endoparasites and virus-infected host cells can have immune evasion mechanisms in common with cancers, such as metabolic reprogramming to aerobic glycolysis leading to excessive secretion of lactic acid and immobilization of local host immunity. This immune evasion tactic provides a therapeutic target for cancer, as shown by our recent finding that patient-derived cancer xenografts can be growth-arrested by specifically inhibiting their lactic acid secretion (as mediated by the MCT4 transporter) - with evidence of host immunity restoration and without generating major host toxicity. Accordingly, the multiplication of bacteria, endoparasites and viruses that primarily depend on metabolic reprogramming to aerobic glycolysis for survival in the human body may be arrested using strategies specifically inhibiting their lactic acid secretion. Targeting immune evasion mechanisms commonly used by pathogens and cancer cells may lead to novel, cancer treatment-based therapy of infectious diseases.